


The Woods Are Watching

by telekinesiskid



Category: Gravity Falls
Genre: Camping, Dipper's Guide To The Unexplained, Found Footage style, Inspired by The Blair Witch Project, Scary Woods, Video Recording
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-04-21
Updated: 2015-04-29
Packaged: 2018-03-25 02:53:25
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,703
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3793966
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/telekinesiskid/pseuds/telekinesiskid
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dipper and Mabel head into the woods on a three-day camping trip in search of a mystical demon for a new episode of Dipper's Guide to the Unexplained. They record everything that they see.</p><p>Their footage is found months later.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Introductions

**Author's Note:**

> Has anyone done this yet? 8V
> 
> I like Gravity Falls. And I like The Blair Witch Project. So this was kind of inevitable.
> 
> Huge thanks to Kiiouex, as usual <3 what a good beta (who is also responsible for this story not ending up with a dumb title like 'Billair Witch' ahaha)

He put fresh batteries in. Next he pushed in the SD card, previously untouched until now.

He pushed the power button and the camcorder slowly came to life.

He hit the rec button.

“Hello? Hello? Uh, testing, testing… One, two, three?”

_“Four, five, six!”_

“Seven– ah, thank you, Mabel. Testing–”

“You’re welcome!”

“–Testing… Hmm. Seems OK.”

He stopped recording and played the footage back. Good. The camcorder was receiving sound just fine. It even picked up Mabel’s voice from all the way across the room. A little faint, but it was nothing he couldn’t work with. He upped the volume, just in case.

“And now the visuals,” he murmured, hitting the record button again. He fit his hand under the strap and carefully roamed the room, turning the camera this way and that. Then he shook it back and forth, slowly at first and then as fast as he could. He turned off the bedroom light – prompting a whine of _“heeey”_ from Mabel – and he put on the IR illuminator. No colour whatsoever, but he could still see everything just as good – just as if the room were now bathed in a pale green light.

 _“Bro,”_ Mabel complained, and Dipper used the night vision to find his way back to the light switch. He tried out all types of lighting, in all types of crammed or open spaces. He hit playback to see that the IR illuminator seemed to work pretty good. _Well_ worth the money. That was really the only thing that mattered.

He went through the rest of the camcorder settings, playing with the zoom, the focus, the shutter speed, the aperture, the white balance, and everything else, until he was satisfied he knew how to handle the camcorder with ease. He needed to know the controls like the back of his hand.

“Bro, you’ve been playing with that thing for half an hour. You’re gonna use up all the battery.”

“Well, that’s why we have _plenty_ of batteries,” he said to her. He held the camcorder out at arm’s length, lens pointed towards him, and he flipped the screen to see himself. He adjusted his cap, which was looking a little lopsided. Then he waved awkwardly. “Hey there, Gravity Falls! Ready to… s-solve another mystery? ‘Cuz I know I am! H-Hah… Yeah, this is stupid,” he sighed.

He hit the button to end recording.

He switched the camcorder off.

*

“Recording now, bro.”

Dipper appeared on screen. Natural morning light streamed in through the windows behind him, giving him a bit of a pale, washed-out look. He beamed up at the camera, failing to catch himself from giving a stupid little wave. He was so excited.

He gave his usual opening lines.

“Hello and welcome back to another episode of Dipper’s Guide to the Unexplained. I’m your host, Dipper Pines. And our chief camera operator is my twin sister, Mabel. Today’s– _ugh.”_

She turned the camcorder so it was on her face. “Don’t be fooled – I _do_ have a last name, and it is in fact also Pines _,”_ she said into the lens and Dipper uttered a loud, pointed _ahem_ to which Mabel scrambled the camcorder back onto the presenter. “Sorry, bro,” she laughed.

Dipper rolled his eyes. And then he remembered he was on camera and needed to maintain an air of professionalism at all times. He stood up straighter, cleared his throat, and frowned with solemnity and importance.

“Today’s mystery is… a little unorthodox,” he conceded. He bent down to pick up the piece of old cardboard he’d used to write up the mystery’s introduction in black marker. He held it out to the camcorder and Mabel stepped back a little to catch all of it in the frame. “Today we investigate, not so much an observable Gravity Fall’s anomaly, but a _creature…_ Specifically, creature number three-two-six.”

He dumped aside the cardboard to pick up Journal 3, flicking it open to the page of interest. He brought it close to the camera and pointed to the black triangular figure. “According to this journal, somewhere in the woods lies the home of a dream demon. An omnipresent, omniscient, otherworldly being that has been around Gravity Falls for at least the past four decades. A demon so _powerful,_ that misfortune and misery will befall all those who try to summon him… so, we’re not gonna summon him.”

Mabel chuckled, “Only because your oh-so-infallible _journal_ didn’t leave instructions for you.”

Dipper threw an irked glance over the camcorder to its operator. _“Mabel_ , shut up, we’re filming _…_ No, we’re not gonna summon him. But we _are_ going to get some proof of this demon’s existence. How exactly are we going to do that, you may be asking?”

“Not really.”

He ignored her, forcing a smile. “Local lore has it that somewhere in the woods is a pyramidal structure assembled out of cursed gold bricks – a point at which the demon _can_ be summoned. If we can find it, that would be more than enough proof that he exists. In order to find this fabled pyramid, we are going on a three-day _camping trip! …_ Uhhh OK, that’s a wrap, Mabes,” he announced, turning away to pick up the cardboard. “Now we gotta get the interviews.”

“What’s his name?”

Dipper faced the camcorder again, face blank. “Huh?”

“The demon’s _name,_ Dips. You didn’t say.”

 _“…Oh,_ uh… Bill. Bill Cipher is his name… _Arghhh,”_ Dipper groaned, smacking one hand to his closed eyes in frustration. “Can’t _believe_ I messed that up– can we do that whole take again?” he begged, and Mabel heaved a great _sigh._ _“What?_ It’s _your_ fault you keep interrupting me all the time and make me forget where–“

“You don’t need to hear this, folks,” Mabel whispered, shutting the camcorder off.


	2. Interviews

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please forgive me if it takes a while to get chapters out - I can only write this story during the day, for reasons which will become apparent later D: I'm like "what's my inspiration again? Blair Witch? Oh yeah and how did that go agai- OH." 
> 
> And then I spook myself too much, like a chump xC

He switched the camcorder on.

He started recording.

The camera settled on their first interviewee of the day – well, the first one who agreed to show on camera, and who also had some time to spare. Dipper manned the camcorder with one hand; he tried to keep it as still as possible as he held out the cardboard caption with his other.

It read: LAZY SUSAN – DINER WAITRESS/SPILLS COFFEE A LOT.

He threw the sign away and then he began, clearing his throat. It’s wasn’t even that there was a tickle in his throat or anything; he’d just seen a lot of people do it. Like it was a staple of importance.

“Lazy Susan, thank you for finding time within your busy schedule to speak with us.”

 _“Oh,”_ she gave a humble wave of her hand. “It’s no problem. I _love_ appearing in you kids’ short films! They’re so _adorable!”_

“Adorable... Right. Susan, have you heard any rumours pertaining to a demonic entity that lurks in these woods at Gravity Falls?”

Susan made a big show of considering the question, humming thoughtfully and squinting her eyes. “Y’know, I _do_ hear some pretty spooky stories every now and again from our night-late customers. A _demon_ though – that’s awfully specific…”

“What stories have you heard?”

“Hmm… I get a lot of backpackers in here – lumberjacks too. Lumberjacks have a lot of stories. They trynna tell me that one minute they were just minding their own business, just working away, chopping away and whatnot, and then the next they just… wake up! Laying on the ground, right next to their axe. And more often than not they’ve just come out of a nightmare – a _really_ badnightmare. I hear about a lot of different dreams, but I’ve noticed they only ever seem to share three details.”

Dipper brought the camcorder a little closer. His voice was just as eager as his camera movements.

“Uh-huh, which were?”

“Well, the first is that they tell me their dream is all in grayscale. No colour, y’know? Not necessarily _creepy,_ but it’s a weirdly consistent detail. The second is _triangles._ They seem these shapes in the dreams, and then they come here and they’re spouting all this _nonsense_ about triangles being _everywhere_ – even when you gotta look _really hard_ to see them. Some of those boys are just _crazy,_ I tell ya.”

“Right… A-And the third?” Dipper pressed when it looked like she had forgotten. “The third shared detail?”

“Oh. The third?” She paused. Her non-lazy eye widened as it stared straight into the lens. The camcorder trembled with Dipper’s anticipation. “They report back a feeling of… being watched. Of _eyes_ following them, watching them. Even after they’ve stopped dreaming… They still feel like the woods,” she turned to gaze out the window into the thick green trees, “are always watching them.”

An unnerving silence settled over them.

The camcorder jerked as Susan suddenly laughed, turning away from the window to face the camera once again. She smoothed out her skirt and patted it down. “They’re so _funny,_ those lumberjacks. I reckon they’re just slacking off. Maybe if they stopped sleeping out there on the job so much then they wouldn’t have so many _nightmares,_ eh?”

“…Thanks for your time, Lazy Susan.”

Surprise crossed her features. “Oh? That’s it? Oh well, you’re quite welcome, kids!”

She rose out of her chair, whistling as she went back behind the counter to serve customers. Dipper set the camcorder down and took a deep breath, exhaling harshly.

“Dipper, I have goosebumps,” Mabel murmured.

“I know, Mabel. Me too.”

He stopped filming.

He shut the camcorder off.

*

He switched the camcorder on.

He started recording.

The screen showed their second interviewee of the day, who just grinned back inanely, like he had no idea who or what he was looking at. He wasn’t Dipper’s top candidate for a brief interview, but everyone else was too busy or knew nothing about the demon. They just had to make do.

Dipper got Mabel to hold up the cardboard sign this time, to minimise shaking. It read: OLD MAN McGUCKET – TOWN HILLBILLY/SPITS IN A BUCKET.

Dipper launched straight into questioning, like a pro, determined not to lose McGucket to his deranged antics so soon.

“Mr McGucket, you often venture out into the woods, correct?”

“Ah-hehe, _yessir!”_

“Do you ever see anything strange out there? Any unnatural, or unexplained phenomena?”

McGucket stared – Dipper didn’t know if that was the right word, since it implied some kind of focus – at him and titled his head, confused. “Eeeh, I don’t follow ya, boy.”

“Have you seen a pyramidal structure in the woods at all, made out of gold bricks–“

 _“Gold bricks?”_ McGucket exclaimed. He laughed, heinous and halted, and he jumped from one foot to the next. The camera angled down to record his little dance. “Why _sure!_ I seen a _ton_ of gold bricks lyin’ out there in the wilderness, just waitin’ to be tripped over! Don’t know where they came from or where they might go! But it’s probably got somethin’ to do with the blue fire!”

“Blue fire?”

 _“Yep!_ That blue fire that I seen in the distance sometimes, as I’m takin’ my nightly stroll! Burned like a hot blue flame on a stove! Tried to follow it once. Never made it. Never got any closer to that fire – even after I was walkin’ for about an hour! _Whooo-ee!”_

“Seriously? …Do you have any pictures– do you have any proof? …Mr McGucket?”

McGucket didn’t seem to be listening. He’d started half-singing, half-laughing again. He skittered away from them, not unlike a crab, back towards the little shelter he’d constructed for himself out of metal scraps in the junkyard.

Dipper sighed, disappointed. He had no idea how credible that testimony even was, coming from a man as _insane_ as McGucket.

He was just about to turn the camcorder off when Mabel grabbed his arm, shaking the camera. She pointed. “Dipper, _look.”_

Dipper refocused the camcorder back on McGucket.

“What the…”

McGucket’s hands were now covered in red paint – or at least Dipper _hoped_ it was paint – and he was scraping them over the sheet of rusted corrugated iron that made up one of his shelter’s walls. He was… drawing a picture.

Dipper brought the camera closer. It was close enough now that it could pick up the words McGucket muttered under his breath, over and over, voice hitched and strained and breathless.

“ _Always watching, ALWAYS WATCHING, always watching, always watching…”_

Dipper inhaled sharply to see McGucket’s blood-red smear of a picture finally come together, and he took a few shaky steps back to get it all in frame.

“Oh my God…”

It was a drawing of a triangle, with an eye in the middle.

It was a drawing of Bill Cipher.

He stopped filming.

He shut the camcorder off.

*

“Kid, what are you doing.”

Dipper fiddled with the dial a little until Stanford Pines, in all his jaded brilliance, came into focus. He was leaning on one arm of his usual chair, holding up one side of his wrinkled face so it was smooshed around dead eyes. It seemed to be a good visual representation of how he probably felt, being roped into another one of “Dipper’s stupid film projects”, as he liked to call them.

“Seriously? Another interview? Are you gonna get spooked by some owl with a maraca and take off again, like in the last one you did?”

“I didn’t get _spooked,_ Grunkle Stan – I was investigating!”

_“Riiight.”_

Mabel appeared at the periphery of the screen to hold another cardboard sign underneath their great uncle. It read: STAN PINES – MYSTERY ENTHUSIAST/CROOK. She took a peek at it and started laughing.

“What?” Stan’s suddenly alert eyes snapped to her. And then to Dipper, behind the camcorder. He narrowed them, demanding, “What the hell did you write about me?”

“No, no– nothing! _Mabel,”_ he hissed, and she took herself off-screen. Dipper cleared his throat. “Grunkle Stan, do you agree to be filmed and let us use this footage for–“

“For _what,_ kid?”

“Uh…”

Mabel leaned in to loudly whisper to Stan, “He gets caught up in his little fantasy of being a televised paranormal investigator. Just _go with it._ Keep him happy.”

 _“Thanks,_ Mabel,” Dipper sighed.

Stan groaned tiredly and had another glug from his opened can of Pitt Cola _._ He gave a dismissive wave and stared off into the distance. “Whatever. If it keeps you kids entertained.”

“So we can interview you?”

Stan fixed him with an irked glare. “What, is there a waiver or something I have to sign? C’mon, kid – I got a tour bus coming through here in about twenty minutes.”

“Yeah OK that’s cool – so, uh, Mr Pines! You’ve lived in Gravity Falls for the past few decades, haven’t you? Have you ever heard any legends, or rumours of a dream demon that haunts these woods that surround your home?”

“Can’t say I have,” Stan intoned, not looking anywhere near the camera.

That brought Dipper up short.

“…Wait, _nothing?_ You haven’t even overheard any of the other townsfolk talk about it or, or you never _saw_ anything in the woods–“

“Listen, kid,” Stan grouched, suddenly facing the camera. He raised one finger point menacingly at him, and he _scowled_. _“Don’t_ go poking around in those woods so much. Whether there’s a demon out there or not – which there _ain’t_ – there’s plenty of other things out there that’ll kill ya. _Real_ things. Not make-believe.”

“But we’re gonna go camping.”

Stan’s eyes widened. His frown deepened. “You’re _not going camping,”_ he muttered through gritted dentures.

“Why not?”

“Because I _said so.”_

“What’s out there, Stan?”

“There’s _nothing_ out there, Dipper–“

“His name is Bill Cipher. Have you heard of him?”

Stan rose from his seat and sharply crushed the can of Pitt Colain his hand. It wasn’t empty; cola gushed from the rips in the aluminium and ran down his bare arm, but he still glared fiercely at Dipper as if it was beneath his notice.

“I have no goddamn idea what you’re talking about, kid, now get that stupid camera _the hell out of my FACE!”_

“Grunkle Stan– hey! _Hey wait-!”_

A hand enclosed over the lens, darkening the screen. The camcorder was wrestled between hands before it bounced to the ground with a sharp _clunk,_ and after a couple of split-second glitches it was knocked out of recording.


End file.
